Discuss the latest comic book news and front page articles, read or post your own reviews of comics, and talk about anything comic book related. Threads from the two subforums below will also show up here. News Stand topics can also be read and posted in from The Asylum.

Who else stops time by having sex to rob banks? Raise your hands. No? Well, get ready to. Matt Fraction (Thor, Hawkeye) & Chip Zdarsky (Monster Cops, Prison Funnies) take you on a sexcapade - wait, that doesn’t sound right - Sex Criminals is a comedy about an inelegant lady named Suzie that isn’t afraid to get dirty - still not sure it’s okay for me to say that... It’s sexy comedy, okay!

Image claims Sex Criminals is in lieu of 40-Year-Old Virgin and Bridesmaids, but it feels more like an informal confessional type comedy such as Easy A, at least to me. It starts out in tragedy, as all good coming-of-age stories do. But the fourth wall is broken early on as we’re assured that the jokes are coming. I’m not 100% sure this fits the character’s dialogue, rather than the writer’s. Nevertheless, fumbling words and awkward encounters make up Suzie’s childhood, providing said jokes. Beginning, middle, & end panels show off her found prowess, cutting back to present Suzie. At the end of the issue we wonder of course what she’s up to with her boyfriend (who just so happens to also stop time when he makes sexy time), and why they have guns in their hands. Robbing banks no doubt, as described in Image’s synopsis, but how will that go for them?

I’m glad that Fraction took the 31 pages to get the story pumping, there’s a lot of baggage to slough out of the way before it can take the next step. No double entendres there… This book isn’t as graphic as I thought it would be, which is actually pretty nice. It’s classy sexposure, coupled with down-to-earth humor. That being said, if you’re looking for garish porn, I wouldn’t suggest this. Still not sure I would ever buy an issue used... Just saying. Smart one, Image.

That’s top-shelf humor, folks and it makes me happy. Zdarsky’s art is par-for-the-course, and I enjoy it in the context of the book.

I’ll be interested in the direction the next issues go, since one can only do so much with robbing banks, trying not to get caught, and frantically having sex/DJ'ing downstairs just to stop time, so we’ll see. I’ll say, while it’s not my typical reading style & it seems to be geared a little more towards mature teenagers & young adults, the story is endearing and it may very well end up as a guilty pleasure of mine. Don’t get weird about that.

Matt Fraction continues his quest to make me uncomfortable reading comics on public transport, first with the lingerie-filled covers of Satellite Sam, and now with his new Image book, which is called Sex Criminals. Damn you Fraction, stop making me look like a perv. I mean, a bigger perv.

I really enjoyed this first issue, and whilst I didn’t find it to be as funny as a ‘sex comedy for comics’ should be, it seems that Fraction is aware of that himself, with the narrator constantly mentioning that the jokes will be along any moment. That said, I did get some laughs here, and it’s a very intriguing premise, that, now that the exposition is out of the way, can only get better and better.

The premise here is a strange one, as it follows a couple who have the ability to freeze time when they orgasm. This issue is narrated by the woman in the couple, Suzie, who takes us through her life up until now. After her father is killed by a random nutjob who was screwed by a stock market crash (the banks play a large role in this story), and her mother is pushed to alcoholism, Suzie has no-one to talk to about the birds and the bees. And in her case, the birds and the bees are even scarier than normal, because when she comes, she stops time. Fraction zips back and forth through Suzie’s life, we see her masturbate for the first time, we see her lose her virginity, and every time, she mysteriously stops time. With no one to tell her about why this is happening to her, she turns to research herself, and falls in love with libraries.

I think the best scenes in this issue were the ones where Suzie talks to ‘The Dirty Girls’ who know about sex, in particular, the scene in the toilets when Rachelle draws a load of hilariously weird sex-positions on the wall. Man, those were so fucked-up and wrong. Fraction showed the same flair here at coming up with hilarious sex stuff as he did at awesome kung-fu moves in Iron Fist, he’s great at stuff like this.

The story really begins in earnest with adult Suzie holding a party to save the Library she works at, which is being foreclosed on by the banks. Here, she meets Jonathan, and they hit it off over a shared love of the book Lolita. The dialogue between them is great, and they have sex. Suzie is expecting time to stop for just her, but it turns out that Jonathan has the same weird ability, and when time stops, they both can still move around. I loved that scene, especially the immortal like ‘Jon… is your dick glowing?’. So, what do these lovebirds do with their superpowers? Well, they fuck in the bathroom at the bank and rob them.

This book is such a weird idea, but Fraction is really committed to it, and I’m excited to see where it goes. Chip Zdarsky is an artist I’m not too familiar with (he seems to be more famous for his online persona than his actual work, but then again, his online persona is very funny) but his cartoonish style really suits the comedic tone of this book, and he really sells the moments of humour here. I liked a lot of the little background jokes here and there, like the posters in the classroom or the doctor’s surgery.

This was, as I said, a strange comic, but it has a lot of promise, we need to support comics like this, that have a unique idea and perspective. I’m not saying sex-based superpowers are the future of comics… but you never know.